Module 8

Taking part in a meeting

Slide presentation

Look through the presentation, then note the ten most important things to do. Agenda in English means l'ordre du jour, and a diary means agenda in French.

What's on the agenda?

Video

Meeting software

10 Things that go wrong in Meetings

Posted March 13, 2014 by Hans Wolters & filed under Tips & Trics.

The other day I was in a meeting. Nothing special, just an ordinary meeting. People around a table, coffee, a chair presiding. A power point.

Here are the 10 things that went wrong that morning:

1. The meeting started 25 minutes late, for a variety of reasons, including that the invitation didn’t state the meeting room and mentioned the wrong date: Tuesday 5 March, instead of Tuesday 4 or Wednesday – the usual meeting day – 5 March.

2. A beamer cable was missing.

3. The power point was far too long with too many words per slide. Attention was slipping quickly.

4. The agenda of the meeting was much too extensive as well and poorly thought through. This caused confusion and irritation towards the end of the meeting.

5. The chair did not really chair: he said interventions had to be short, but many people spoke too long while others – were they women by accident?- weren’t asked for input.

6. Four out of twelve people were checking texts, e-mails and perhaps other things during the meeting on their tablets and iPhones.

7. The pens for the flip chart had dried out. Someone went out to find better ones, came back with better ones, but also with the message that there was someone waiting for the chair. Which caused the chair to leave the room for 20 minutes…

8. No one was taking notes or action points.

9. Towards the end of the meeting, people started to leave, discussing last things in standing, agreeing on a possible next meeting date, which was later rejected.

Meetings are precious. So when you do a meeting, make sure it is well prepared, that the agenda is clear, that follow up is well organised: 6 people waiting 25 minutes is 2½ hrs. of lost working time.

And one more thing:

10. Better coffee would really have helped create a better atmosphere…

source: http://www.organisationdevelopmentsupport.eu/2014/03/13/10-things-that-go-wrong-in-meetings/

Have you aver experienced any of these complaints during a meeting?

Assignment

How can IT help prepare and organise meetings in a firm?

Vocabulary: input expressing one's ideas and point of view. To chair a meeting, to preside over a meeting.